women

Women are still low on the economic totem pole. A new Census report shows nothing has changed, women still make 77¢ to a male's dollar when both are working at full-time jobs and if one includes part-time, the ratio is even lower, 71¢. Worse than that, women with families and no husband around make the lowest median income of all, $34,002.

It is 2013 and a dirty little secret is once again coming to light. Silicon valley is devoid of women computer scientists and engineers. It all started at a tech conference where two men in the audience were engaging in tech's typical juvenile sex jokes chatter with a woman techie sitting right in front of them.

The election was won by identity politics. Black people voted for President Obama by over 93%, Hispanics 71% and Asians 73%. The exit polls show 55% of women voted for Obama, whereas 59% of white people voted for Romney. Ninety percent who thought the economy is good voted for Obama. Those who thought it is not so good voted for Romney by 60% margins.

Why Romney lost so big is a topic really outside our purview, yet we'll put in our 2¢ that it might be due to campaign rhetoric on policies promised. Unfortunately, there are words and there are deeds. What has the Obama administration done economically for the demographic groups who gave President Obama a second term?

Ah, the never ending word gotcha games of Election 2012. The Internets went abuzz with binders as a symbol of female oppression after the second Presidential debate. We even have Amazon office binder reviews being carpet bombed with political statements. While funny as hell, economic oppression of women is not so funny. Nor is it a word game.

Today our statistic is from Mitt Romney. Team Romney claims women have lost 92.3% of the jobs since Obama took office. U.S. Treasury Secretary Geithner, acting as political pundit, calls Romney's new favorite statistic ridiculous.

First off Romney is right. Since Obama took office in January 2009, the below graph shows the total job losses by women as a percentage of the total job losses. As of March 2012, it is 92.3%.

Prosecutors acknowledged that there were significant credibility issues with the hotel housekeeper who accused Mr. Strauss-Kahn of trying to rape her in May. In a brief hearing at State Supreme Court in Manhattan, prosecutors did not oppose his release; the judge then freed Mr. Strauss-Kahn on his own recognizance.

The Supreme Court just landed a body blow to women. They sided with Wal-Mart on a class action sex discrimination lawsuit by blowing apart the class action status of the suit. The court was unanimous that the case was too big, yet the decision was split to let the case be reformed for another chance. The court ruled 5-4 against the women of Wal-Mart.

The case was seeking damages for 1.5 million women. In 2001, Wal-Mart had only 14% of women in management and 80% of women in the lowest paid positions. Wal-Mart also allowed local managers to use their own discretion in hiring and promotion decisions. NPR:

When the case was filed 10 years ago, women held two-thirds of the lowest-level hourly jobs and only one-third of the management jobs; and that women were paid on average $1.16 less per hour than men in the same jobs, despite having more seniority and higher performance ratings.

A lower court previously ruled the case should encompass all women who work at all Walmart stores. SCOTUS used the phrase commonality and quoted statistics to claim because 1.5 million women didn't have the same common experience, magically 1.5 million women at Wal-Mart are not subject to systemic discrimination. From the actual ruling:

One of the more amazing spins of the day is how the term diversity has been cast to mean global labor. The original term was for United States Domestic diversity. In other words, giving equal opportunity in a nation to all of her citizens.

Well, there are now damning reports coming to light on what is happening to a large segment of the American Professionals and that is women.